Today: Perfectly smooth DIY hummus in a fraction of the time -- thanks to a simple, brilliant trick.

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You will go to picnics and barbecues this summer, and there will be that person who brings the laziest contribution this side of a bag of Doritos: the store-bought tub of hummus. Maybe a sack of wet baby carrots to go with.

And you won't judge them, because you're nice.

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Tubbed hummus has become that friendly convenience food that everyone accepts -- it's the new, improved French onion dip. It's so popular, it even comes in guacamole flavor. (Now you can start judging.)

But that stuff in the tubs -- as healthy and quick and easy as it may be -- is never going to be as good as the real thing. The real thing is rich and sultry and alive. It is tumbling over with nutty tahini and pricks of lemon and garlic and salt. It tugs at you so hard you want to drink it, not pop it open as a sensible snack.

I have the real thing for you. And it's a hell of a lot easier to make -- and faster -- than you'd think.

There are a few camps in DIY hummusry: from the people content to grind up a can of chickpeas, rustic-like, to those who methodically peel each chickpea for optimum smoothness.

As Food52er ejm wrote to me, "Besides being amazingly simple, it accomplishes the holy grail of smooth silky hummus without the craziness that is peeling the chickpeas." From Kristen Earle, "It's the lightest, creamiest, richest hummus I've ever been able to conjure. I'll never eat store-bought hummus again."

So it's simple and the results are perfect, but here's the real coup: Most from-scratch hummus recipes involve simmering the chickpeas for 1 1/2 to 2 hours. Ottolenghi and Tamimi's are done in 20 to 40 minutes. How?

Plenty of hummus recipes (even earlier versions from Ottolenghi himself) call for soaking or simmering the chickpeas with a little baking soda shaken into the water. Hervé This explains why in Molecular Gastronomy -- it's all about pH: alkaline environments soften legumes more quickly by weakening their pectic bonds, while acidic environments keep them stubbornly hard. This is why you never want to simmer beans with vinegar.

The version in Jerusalem does them one better: after soaking, the drained chickpeas are sautéed with baking soda for a few minutes, before dumping in the water to simmer the chickpeas -- a technique learned from Tamimi's grandmother.

"We chose Sami's grandmother's way because we believe the friction helps the breaking down of the skins and gets the baking soda to penetrate the skin better," Ottolenghi told me. This brief, direct contact allows them to cook much faster and puree smoother. Without peeling.

A couple final clever tricks seal the deal: you'll blend in ice water at the end to help lighten up the emulsion. And you'll rest the hummus for 30 minutes, to let the flavors and textures settle in. And then you'll pour olive oil all over it and scoop it up with torn bread in heavy, spilt-over measures.

Now just imagine what will happen when you're that person who brings this to the barbecue.

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I'm an ex-economist, ex-Californian who moved to New York to work in food media in 2007. Dodgy career choices aside, I can't help but apply the rational tendencies of my former life to things like: recipe tweaking, digging up obscure facts about pizza, and deciding how many pastries to put in my purse for "later."

The recipe worked as advertised. Peas cooked in about 40 minutes and the hummus was smooth as silk. But it was too much tahini for my taste. Somewhat overpowering. Extra lemon juice helped some. The can I bought did not designate if it was “light roast” or not, but it was all I could find. I think next time I will cut the tahini at least by half, and increase the lemon, garlic, and salt. This will be a winner, just need to tweak it to my liking.
It makes a lot though. Can hummus be frozen?

We have been making hummus once a week, alternating between this recipe and Ottolenghi's different hummus recipe in Plenty. We had reservations about the amount of tahini, and we have to cook the chickpeas for longer than the recipe indicates, but the hummus is AMAZING.

This was last weekends "new" recipe. I found a lot of the skins popped off to the top of the boiling water which I skimmed off. I did mix the tahini with lemon juice and water before adding it to the chickpeas, as I had previously made cold noodles that had this trick. The tahini will thicken with the water/juice before it smooths out again and lightens to resemble thick cream. Do not be put off by the amount of liquid you need to add to the tahini. I also put a drizzle of truffle oil, toasted pine nuts and a sprinkle of smoked paprika on top when I served it. The "topping" all disappeared (uf dah!). Added to scrambled eggs yesterday. Heaven!

Jerusalem is a fabulous cookbook but the hummus recipe is one I find off. Why add so much tahini? I have made hummus from scratch for years using 1/3 cup tahini to 1 cup chickpeas (dried) and it is very smooth

Hi! This web site has been revelation for me :) I wanted to ask, since I live ina country which is gastronomically quite poor, I wanted to ask is there a way of making tahini by yourself? I know it a sesame pasta, but does anything else go in it? Thank you in advamce and keep up the great work!

Tahini is basically sesame seeds ground to a fine paste with extra mild flavored oil. Doing it at home will not give you super smooth kind but it will be probably even better flavor than many store bought, and you can experiment with raw versus toasted seeds.

For those who want to skin their beans, and I have skins thousands, here is how I do it. 1-wash the dry beans 2-boil water 3-pour boiling water over beans to cover 4-leave covered with a clean kitchen towel on the counter overnight. In the morning some skins will come away from the beans. 5-Pour soaking water off and rinse the beans. 6-Boil the beans until tender. Here is how the skin is removed: 7-When the beans have cooled, I use a terry type kitchen towel and put a cup or so in the middle of the towel. I fold over all sides to the center to make a package. 8-I then roll the towel with my palms as if I am kneading the beans like bread, rolling it back and forth hard on my dining table. I do this to all the beans. 9-Then I put the beans in a bowl of water and many of the skins with float to the top. Some beans will have to be pinched between my thumb and forefinger to release the skin. This can take awhile.Why do I do this? Because the skins of all beans and most seeds, nuts and veggies contain phytic acid. Phytic acid binds calcium, iron and other minerals to it prohibiting the body from absobing these minerals. Soaking, cooking and peeling rids the beans of a lot of phytic acid. On the other hand phytic acid and the skins slow digestion which is helpful to diabetics as I have read. It has other benefits you can find online. Skinned beans make for a smoother more delicious hummus and soy "milk".

I made this hummus last week- delicious but SO THICK! I used an entire bag of beans and an entire jar of Tahini (which, in my opinion, just adds calories). It was bland so I kept adding garlic and lemon. When finished it was warm, delicous and very loose. However, the next morning, it was super firm. Still delicious though. I also used the baking soda and though there was constant foam that had to be skimmed, not ONE peel came off the beans!Will try again, but I think that canned garbanzos would be great as well, or Trader Joe Mediteranian Hummus!

I made this today for a pot luck... I confess I was really busy and didn't have time to go and buy dried chick peas. Used two cans and it turned out delicious. I will make it again from scratch for sure